CorpRaider

If you told me you would wipe over half a million people off the population balance, I would think it would be deflationary, but I guess most of those people were economically productive.

I am not surprised that the young professionals and intelligentsia prefer to be where the other young professionals and intelligentsia are.

I really think that has to factor into his option value of the cash balances he holds weighed against other options.

To me a useful analogy is real estate. Are you a "cash flow" investor or an "appreciation" investor. One (as I understand it) likes good income to price ratios and buys off the beaten path, one buys stuff in hot markets and bets on continued appreciation for their gainz.

the 2nd quarter of over 6% annualized share reduction + continuation in the 1st quarter shows that Berkshire is increasingly comfortable with a ~100% payou ration and capping the growth of excess capital (if the stock price is sufficiently cheap). think we knew this already, but it's always good to get confirmation. Likewise, we could comp BNSF to UNP and get a number of $120B or whatever, but it's also great to see that "pretty much a toss up" language from the GOAT. I think it would be totally rational to think about a 7% run rate distribution (still aiming for 10%+ returns on retained earnings, so you will still grow if you're achieving that...and shrink of not). Buybacks if stock is cheap/fair, special dividend if not. May provide a useful template to set up for the Greg/successor and would work to allow Gates foundation to get steady funding.

"Buffett is my Wells contra." - Munger

Interesting pitch on A Walkers pod. I followed Iconix for a while. I do like the content "studios/labels" (relative to their prices).

Buy more Berkshire below historical reported book.

Reduced VIAC position. What's my next move..."Talk to me Goose."

Wonder if Bill Gates told Warren that 5G is going to decimate the cable/fiber guys in time and/or he's going to make everyone switch to Verizon once the vaccines are fully distributed.

VZ and CVX. ;D

You mean interesting upcoming spins?

I thought $50 was/is a fair price, but you're right I should probably sit on my duff and cash the dividends and just start monitoring the moving averages and stuff.

I'm about to dump my AIRC.

Wow, Bitcoin and Burgers. What's not to like!?

I will struggle with the self-loathing if it's Google. Markel would be weird, but I could get enthused if he was like we're the biggest holder now, Gayner is 100% in charge.

BK, I really like that new impossible whopper. ;D

I started looking at a couple of the Japanese trading cos with ADRs after the BRK investment. As a retail schmuck, I set it aside, deciding it was probably more attractive for me if I gained potential options on future JVs (i.e., by going through BRK).

WoW

At last disclosure (the 10-Q), Berkshire owned 964.5 million Apple shares. Multiply by today's price and you get $126 Billion pre-tax. Unless he sold some after quarter end. I saw this video back in 2003, and I was too clueless to buy anyf APPL, when I should have backed up the truck. I wrote like two blog posts about how Buffett, the GOAT, was going to over index to Apple and the rest of active managers were underweight when he was buying it and that I would bet with him any day. Then, I went and bought some damn fool trash stocks instead. haha

VIAC keeps ripping on these like vaccine announcements and stuff with value and I'm like "I should sell this, it's just getting caught in with the value basket." Then it fades to the end of the day. Oh well.

100% agree with you about the housing and transport Greg. Wish I had figured that out a car or two earlier. ;D

Sorry for necro thread. I was about to reply to Neckar capital on Twitter about this guy and remembered this thread. Just wanted to add there are a few details about Buffett's view on the Wattles in question (unsurprisingly, you guys are right it's the Jersey guy as far as I can tell) in some of the early Forbes/Fortune interviews (was just "leafing" through those incident to this message to Nekar cap)...the 1969 interview with Forbes quotes WEB talking about the Wattles of american manufacturing (the jersey guy). Valuewalk has a pdf of some of the articles available for download in his site. I tweeted a link.

My "Beardstown Ladies Method" annual return for 2020 is 25%. Did about 6% across the portfolio, but a lot of that is indexed/AA. I actually posted a loss of almost 12% in the soon to be renamed Shadenfruede Fund (just an IRA I putz about with and actually track closely). In my defense, if you did really well this year, you are very likely a dope. ;D BRK was up ~1.5%; RPV was down ~9%; QQQ was up ~46%; ZM was up ~400%, and that ticker that people thought was Zoom, Inc. but was actually totally another unrelated company was up ~900% (kidding).

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! I will refrain from commenting about "roaring 20's" this time...oof level 1000.